A class five student of a convent school in Uttar Pradesh’s Gorakhpur took his life by consuming poison after allegedly being punished by a teacher. The boy had consumed poison on 15 September and passed away at the BRD medical college on 21 September, Wednesday.

Suicide note

A suicide note was recovered from the student’s school bag in which he had reportedly claimed that he decided to end his life since he was subjected to harsh punishment by the teacher.

According to a report by the India Today, 12-year-old Navneet Prakash, a bright student of Saint Antony’s Convent School, mentioned these words in his suicide note:

“Papa, Today is my first exam and my class teacher kept me crying till 9.15 am… I was kept standing for three periods. She only listens to her sycophants. I am going to end my life today. I am going to end my life today… Please ask ma’am not to give such a severe punishment to anyone. Goodbye, mummy, papa and didi.”

The incident

The boy was upset from the time he had got home after being allegedly harassed and denied taking the exams. His father, Ravi Prakash, physics teacher at the Bapu Inter College said, “He quietly went upstairs and came down after some time to ask for food. His mother gave him food and he had a bit of it with the water he had brought along with himself in a glass.”

When Navneet did not come down for a long time, his parents went upstairs only to find him lying on the floor with foam coming out of his mouth. On seeing him in this condition, his parents rushed him to the nearby hospital.

He was later taken to the Baba Raghav Das Medical College and Hospital where the doctors declared him dead on Wednesday afternoon.

The parents have blamed the school authorities for the death of their ward. Agitated by the incident, they have hurled stones at the school building, thus damaging window panes and vehicles.

Ravi Prakash also added that his son used to be an extremely bright student and he used to be regularly harassed by the teacher, Bhavna, to join her tuition classes.

On Thursday afternoon, a postmortem was conducted and the report is awaited. A FIR was registered at the Shahpur Police station, Gorakhpur under the Section 306 (abetment to suicide) of the IPC.

SSP Satyartha Aniruddh Pankaj told The Logical Indian, “On the basis of the complaint lodged by his parents, a case has been registered against the school and the cause of death would be ascertained only upon receiving the post-mortem report. The teacher in the context has been arrested.”

The mother of Navneet, Sunita Devi told the India Today, “We are Dalits and our son Navneet was very brilliant. He dreamt of becoming the chief minister and his role model was the CM of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath.

The Logical Indian community condemns the action taken by the teacher in this context. We must take into consideration that students are extremely sensitive towards such extreme punishments. It affects them to a large extent and more often than not it leaves a permanent scar in their minds. Teachers should be more sensitive towards children and they should be trained how to deal with the kids in a much tolerant fashion.

Partner Story

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